europe

Europe

AMartinez — Thu, 30 Jan 2020 15:05:26 +0000

Europe AMartinez Thu, 01/30/2020 - 10:05

Essays and Discussions

Suggestions for essay topics that enable students to dive deeper into the material found in the module and conduct their own research and analysis.

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Model Diplomacy

Free classroom simulations of either the U.S. National Security Council (NSC) or the UN Security Council.

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Classroom Reading List

Supplemental readings and other resources to help students explore a full range of issues and debates related to the module materials. The list offers readings well suited to a wide variety of students.

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Policy Briefs

In this lesson plan, students will assume the role of an advisor to the leader of a European country, read a scenario, and make a policy recommendation.

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Assessing the EU

In this lesson plan, students will assess the European Union (EU).

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Infographic

In this lesson plan, students look for patterns across the European continent and present their findings as an infographic.

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Europe - U.S. Foreign Policy

btran — Tue, 28 Jan 2020 20:32:38 +0000

Europe - U.S. Foreign Policy

In his 1796 farewell address, President George Washington cautioned the United States to steer clear of foreign entanglements. Until the twentieth century, U.S. policymakers mostly honored this advice, staying out of Europe’s conflicts both on the continent and in its colonies around the world. Even after joining World War I and decisively turning the tide, the United States bolted back across the Atlantic soon after a peace agreement was signed. But that tendency changed with World War II, the largest mobilization of U.S. military service members in the country’s history. The United States emerged from the war as a superpower with global interests, and invested heavily in the security and economic prosperity of Europe. No longer an isolationist country, the United States would go on to forge deep and lasting ties with Europe. And as World War II gave way to the Cold War, foreign entanglements—with Europe and around the world—became the norm.

btran Tue, 01/28/2020 - 15:32

Early Attempts at International Cooperation Are Abandoned

Editorial cartoon from 1919 depicts US President Woodrow Wilson as he pulls a reluctant young American patriot towards the 'Temple of Peace,' which represents the League of Nations.

Source: Stock Montage/Getty Images

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The United States largely stayed out of European conflicts until the final two years of World War I. President Woodrow Wilson framed his decision to declare war against Germany—after years of careful neutrality—as a critical investment in world peace. The United States needed to have a seat at the peace talks to help shape the postwar international order. In 1918, Wilson outlined an idealistic vision in his Fourteen Points speech: imperialism would be dismantled and colonies would have a path to self-determination—the idea that people have the right to choose their own government. Most importantly, disputes would be resolved by a new international organization, the League of Nations. Later that year, as the first sitting U.S. president to visit Europe, Wilson attended the Versailles peace talks brimming with bold ideas. Wilson succeeded in creating the League of Nations (the precursor to the United Nations), but he was unsuccessful in securing U.S. membership in the organization. Congress voted against joining, and the United States retreated into isolationism. Without universal membership or effective enforcement measures, the league failed, and Europe was soon at war, again.

Editorial cartoon from 1919 depicts US President Woodrow Wilson as he pulls a reluctant young American patriot towards the 'Temple of Peace,' which represents the League of Nations.

Source: Stock Montage/Getty Images

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From Isolationism to Engagement: The Rise of the U.S.-Europe Partnership

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When the Second World War broke out in 1939, the United States, wary of getting embroiled in another overseas conflict and still grappling with the Great Depression, opted to remain on the sidelines. According to a 1940 poll, just 7 percent of Americans supported the country entering the war on the side of the Allies (France, the Soviet Union, and the United Kingdom), but secretly, the United States had been sending military weapons and equipment to the United Kingdom as part of the Lend-Lease policy. On December 7, 1941, Japan attacked the U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor, pushing the country into World War II. President Franklin D. Roosevelt condemned it as “a date which will live in infamy;” it was also a day that launched the United States’ decades-long involvement on the European continent.

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U.S. Intervention Shifts Tide of World War II

U.S. troops wade through water after reaching Normandy, France and landing Omaha beach on D Day, June 6, 1944.

Source: Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group via Getty Images

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By the end of 1941, Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Germany was well on the way to victory in World War II. Germany and Italy—two of the Axis powers, along with Japan—controlled most of continental Europe. France had surrendered after just six weeks of fighting the Germans. The Soviet Union, which had previously signed a nonaggression pact with Germany, was caught completely off guard when Germany invaded it earlier that year. Britain found itself almost alone, and vastly outnumbered. But when the first U.S. troops landed in Europe the very next year, the tide began to shift against the Axis powers, as Germany found itself caught in between a Soviet counteroffensive on its eastern front, and a decisive U.S. offensive in the west. By the war’s end, some sixteen million Americans would serve in Europe and the Pacific, making World War II the largest mobilization of U.S. military service members in the country’s history. It also came at a tremendous cost. More than four hundred thousand American service members died in the fight against the Axis powers —a death toll greater than all of the United States’ other overseas wars combined. When Nazi Germany surrendered on May 8, 1945, the United States stood victorious and in a powerful position to direct Europe’s post-war future.

U.S. troops wade through water after reaching Normandy, France and landing Omaha beach on D Day, June 6, 1944.

Source: Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group via Getty Images

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How Containment Came to Define U.S. Cold War Strategy

United States Information Service poster distributed in Asia depicts a man ready to defend the Philippines from communism, 1951.

Source: U.S. National Archives and Records Administration

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With Nazi Germany defeated, the United States set its sights on a new adversary: the Soviet Union. Led by Joseph Stalin, the Soviet Union began supporting communist governments across Eastern Europe in the aftermath of World War II. Soon, however, the threat of Soviet influence became clear—a direct challenge to the United States and its promotion of democratic, capitalist governments. On the heels of a devastating world war, the United States faced a dilemma: Should it directly confront the powerful Soviet Union and risk another major conflict, or should it look the other way, potentially allowing communism to spread? Instead, the United States opted for a third approach, containment. This strategy sought to maintain a balance of power between the United States and the Soviet Union but pledged to confront the Soviets when that balance was threatened, especially in areas geopolitically important to the United States. Containment would become the basis of U.S. strategy throughout the Cold War and was used to justify U.S. interventions across Europe and around the world.

United States Information Service poster distributed in Asia depicts a man ready to defend the Philippines from communism, 1951.

Source: U.S. National Archives and Records Administration

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Rebuilding Europe and Containing Communism Through the Marshall Plan

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World War II devastated Europe, displacing fifty million people as fighting destroyed entire cities. The United States, meanwhile, emerged as a global power. This time, instead of retreating across the Atlantic as it did following World War I, it worked to prop Europe back up. In 1947, U.S. Secretary of State George Marshall announced a multibillion-dollar plan to provide aid to any European country trying to rebuild its economy. But the Marshall Plan was not merely charity; it was a cornerstone of U.S. Cold War strategy. The United States believed that Europe’s physical, economic, and political collapse made it vulnerable to encroaching Soviet influence. In providing aid, the United States sought to shore up its democratic allies. Sure enough, each of the sixteen Western European countries that accepted funds from the $13-billion-Marshall Plan (more than $130 billion in today’s dollars) experienced rapid economic recovery and deepened relations with the United States. The Soviet Union and Eastern European countries, on the other hand, rejected the aid, fearing it would give the United States influence over their economies.

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An Unprecedented Alliance: The North Atlantic Treaty Organization

In addition to rebuilding Western Europe’s economies, the United States helped ensure the region’s security following World War II. In particular, the United States feared the Soviet Union’s growing military presence in Europe following a 1948 revolution in Czechoslovakia, which installed a communist government on Germany’s border. In response, the United States agreed to provide military assistance to rebuild Western Europe’s armies, and in 1949 the United States, Canada, and ten European countries formed a military alliance known as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). The cornerstone of this alliance was mutual security, the pledge that an attack on one country would be treated as an attack on all. This groundbreaking peacetime alliance made the United States—with its outsized military strength—effectively the defender of Western Europe. During the Cold War, the United States stationed more than four hundred thousand troops throughout Europe along with missiles positioned to strike Moscow. Despite tensions that occasionally flared, the Cold War stayed mostly cold in Europe, with NATO and the threat of nuclear war effectively deterring armed conflict on the continent.

Proxy Fights Define U.S.-Soviet Cold War Relationship

U.S. soldiers are evacuated by helicopter from a Vietcong position on December 11, 1965 in Vietnam.

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The Cold War effectively divided the world into three distinct camps. The First World (also known as the Western Bloc) consisted of the United States, Western Europe, and its capitalist allies. The Second World (also known as the Eastern Bloc) comprised the Soviet Union and friendly communist and socialist countries. Finally, the Third World represented the countries that sought to remain neutral throughout the great power struggle, though some were pulled in. While the United States and the Soviet Union never directly fought during the Cold War, the two rivals engaged in proxy conflicts throughout much of the Third World. In Latin America, Africa, and East Asia, U.S. policymakers acted on the belief that a country falling to communism would cause a ripple effect among its neighbors. Known as the domino theory, this was the main argument justifying the United States’ costliest Cold War engagement—the Vietnam War, waged for twenty years as officials feared the spread of communism in Cambodia, Laos, and across Southeast Asia.

U.S. soldiers are evacuated by helicopter from a Vietcong position on December 11, 1965 in Vietnam.

Source: AFP via Getty Images

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To Win War of Narratives, Cold War Goes to Space

Astronaut Edwin Aldrin facing U.S. flag during the Apollo 11 moon landing on July 20, 1969.

Source: NASA/ullstein bild via Getty Images

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The Cold War was not just a war of weapons; it was also a war of narratives. In arts, culture, science, and sports, the two superpowers used their soft power to convince the world of their superiority. Hollywood, the Olympics, even chess competitions became cultural battlefields for the United States and the Soviet Union. But arguably the Cold War’s highest-profile soft power competition occurred in outer space. The so-called space race, which lasted from the 1950s through the early 1970s, saw the two superpowers competing for a series of milestones: which would be the first to launch a satellite, send a man into orbit, or walk on the moon. (Answers: the Soviets in 1957, the Soviets in 1961, and the Americans in 1969.) The 1969 Apollo 11 moon landing was the most-watched event in television history at its time (more than five hundred million people tuned in around the world), and was a major soft power victory for the United States.

Astronaut Edwin Aldrin facing U.S. flag during the Apollo 11 moon landing on July 20, 1969.

Source: NASA/ullstein bild via Getty Images

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From Brief Détente, Agreements Emerge

Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev (center left) and U.S. President Gerald Ford stand outside before the start of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe in Helsinki, Finland on July 14, 1957.

Source: TASS via Getty Images

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Starting in the late 1960s, a decade-long thawing of the Cold War, known as détente, led to some productive agreements. The nuclear arms race was taking an economic toll on the United States and the Soviet Union, and, geopolitically, both were weakened: the Soviets had lost their alliance with powerful Communist China, and the United States was still mired in the Vietnam War. Amid these circumstances, the two sides agreed to a series of treaties aimed at stopping the spread and development of nuclear weapons technology, and in 1975, signed the Helsinki Final Act, along with thirty-three European countries. Since the 1950s, the Soviets had been seeking recognition of post–World War II borders; this agreement delivered that, in exchange for guarantees from the Soviets on human rights and free flow of information. But by the end of the 1970s, détente was breaking down: the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in 1979, and arms control talks stalled.

Source: TASS via Getty Images

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U.S. Pressure Contributes to End of Cold War

U.S. President Ronald Reagan gives "Tear down this wall" speech on the West German side of Berlin on June 12, 1987.

Source: Günter Schneider/ullstein bild via Getty Images

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Experts debate which factors brought about the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. Internally, Moscow was grappling with an economy in freefall, growing unrest throughout its satellite states, and an ineffective bureaucracy. At the same time, U.S. foreign policy of the 1980s sought to place added pressure on Moscow. Going beyond containment, President Ronald Reagan pledged to take on the Soviets more directly. Through the so-called Reagan doctrine, the United States armed anti-communist guerrillas and resistance movements in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Concurrently, the Reagan administration ramped up America’s military budget. Reagan also kept open diplomatic lines with his Soviet counterpart, Mikhail Gorbachev, perhaps most famously exhorting him to “tear down” the Berlin Wall, which separated communist East Berlin from democratic West Berlin. Soon after the wall fell in 1989, Germany reunified, the Soviet Union dissolved without incident, and the United States emerged as the world’s sole superpower.

U.S. President Ronald Reagan gives "Tear down this wall" speech on the West German side of Berlin on June 12, 1987.

Source: Günter Schneider/ullstein bild via Getty Images

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Iraq War Exposes Divisions in Atlantic Partnership

In the 1990s, NATO members joined the United States in its military campaign in the former Yugoslavia. And after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, NATO joined the United States in the war in Afghanistan—the only time the collective defense pledge of the North Atlantic Treaty, known as Article 5, has been invoked. But when the United States invaded Iraq in 2003 on the grounds that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction, the move divided the Atlantic alliance. Some countries such as Poland and the United Kingdom sent troops to help with the occupation of Iraq. Meanwhile, France and Germany led a political coalition that opposed the intervention, with France threatening to veto the United States’ efforts at the United Nations. The European public overwhelmingly opposed the war; just 7 percent of French and 10 percent of British people supported joining the United States without UN approval.

Tense Alliance Between Turkey and United States

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan addresses provincial election officials at the headquarters of his ruling Justice and Development (AK) Party in Ankara, Turkey on January 29, 2019.

Source: Adem Altan/AFP via Getty Images

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The United States’ most fraught relationship with a NATO ally is with Turkey—a country strategically situated at the crossroads of Asia and Europe. Since the end of the Cold War, the United States had hoped that Turkey would serve as a model of a liberal, Muslim democracy for the Middle East, but that aspiration never materialized. Under the presidency of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey has become increasingly authoritarian, as dissidents are arrested, newspapers are shut down, and independent courts are suspended. At the same time, Turkey is warming up to Russia; it even purchased a missile defense system from Russia to the sharp rebuke of the United States. And, in Syria, Turkey and the United States have nearly come to blows over their opposing treatment of Kurdish forces. Relations between Turkey and the United States have deteriorated so much that in 2019 President Donald J. Trump threatened to “devastate Turkey economically” over their disagreements in Syria—an unprecedented threat against a NATO ally.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan addresses provincial election officials at the headquarters of his ruling Justice and Development (AK) Party in Ankara, Turkey on January 29, 2019.

Source: Adem Altan/AFP via Getty Images

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Return to Rivalry: U.S.-Russia Relations Deteriorate in Post-Cold War Era

Russian President Vladimir Putin meets with US President Barack Obama on the sidelines of the G20 Leaders Summit in Hangzhou, China on September 5, 2016.

Source: Alexei Druzhinin/AFP via Getty Images

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In 1992, just after the Cold War ended, 66 percent of Americans held a favorable view of Russia. Over the next few years, the United States sent economic advisors and billions of dollars in aid to Russia to help restructure its economy, and the two countries signed landmark arms control agreements. But in less than twenty years, this optimism disappeared, as the United States and Russia once again returned to open rivalry. Not all experts agree over what changed. Some point to President Vladimir Putin’s stoking of anti-Western sentiments, particularly as the country’s economy collapsed in the late 1990s. Others suggest that Russia bristled at NATO’s enlargement and the perceived humiliation of the former Soviet superpower by the West. What is clear is that relations today are at a low point. In 2008 and 2014, the United States sanctioned Russia after it invaded Georgia and annexed the Ukrainian territory of Crimea. In 2016, Russia directly interfered in the United States’ presidential election, prompting even more sanctions. And, today, the two countries are returning to old, Cold War–like patterns of backing opposing sides in conflicts around the world in countries like Syria and Venezuela.

Russian President Vladimir Putin meets with US President Barack Obama on the sidelines of the G20 Leaders Summit in Hangzhou, China on September 5, 2016.

Source: Alexei Druzhinin/AFP via Getty Images

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Questioning U.S.-Europe Alliance in Age of Trump

Since the end of World War II, one basic principle has shaped U.S. foreign policy: strong alliances enhance the United States’ power around the world. In turn, U.S. presidents since the 1940s have all sought to cultivate close relationships with allies in Europe—countries like France, Germany, and the United Kingdom—that share the United States’ outlook on democracy and world order. But, under the Donald J. Trump administration, the value of the U.S.-Europe partnership is being seriously questioned. Trump has publicly attacked America’s closest allies, derided countries for not contributing enough to NATO, and even considered withdrawing the United States from the alliance altogether. Meanwhile, he has warmed up to authoritarian politicians in Hungary, Poland, and Russia. While the United States has long believed that a strong, democratic Europe is in its own interest, the country may now be returning to its post–World War I isolationist tendencies by questioning such decades-long alliances.

U.S. Foreign Policy

Europe - Geopolitics

btran — Tue, 28 Jan 2020 20:06:58 +0000

Europe - Geopolitics

In the aftermath of the Cold War, East-West relations had a chance at a reset. In a move that remains controversial, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) offered membership to some former Soviet republics and satellite states that sought to join the alliance. Opponents argued the move alienated Russia, but others countered it accelerated countries’ paths to democracy. At one point, Russia itself expressed interest in joining the alliance, but that ultimate concession to the West never materialized. Today, Russian actions in Europe and around the world are again a source of tension. Meanwhile, the European Union (EU) has grown into an influential political bloc with twenty-seven members (excluding the UK, which voted to leave in 2016). It leverages this strength in numbers to drive its agenda on global challenges, like data privacy and climate change, though its members diverge on some foreign policy areas, like their willingness to cooperate with China.

btran Tue, 01/28/2020 - 15:06

Russian Interventions in Georgia and Ukraine Reignite Tensions

The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 marked the end of the Cold War. But tensions between Moscow and Western Europe returned in just a matter of years. In 2008, Russia invaded the country of Georgia to the sharp rebuke of the West. And in 2014, Russia moved troops into eastern Ukraine and seized the Crimean peninsula soon after the country ousted its Russia-friendly president. The move marked the most significant annexation of territory in Europe since World War II, defying the global norm that military force should not be used to change borders. In response, the EU—along with the United States, Japan, and several other countries—imposed economic sanctions on Russia. These sanctions, along with falling oil prices, cost the country billions of dollars, and plunged its economy into a financial crisis. Russia responded with counter-sanctions against Western food imports. Much of those sanctions remain in place to this day amid deep mistrust between Russia and Western Europe.

European Countries Attempt to Save Iran Nuclear Deal

R-L) US Secretary of State John Kerry, British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond, Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, Head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization Ali Akbar Salehi, Iran's Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini, German Minister for Foreign Affairs Frank-Walter Steinmeier, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius and China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi pose for a phoro after concluding the Iran nuclear talk meetings with a deal in Vienna, Austria on July 14, 2015.

Source: Hasan Tosun/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

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In 2015, six of the world’s most powerful countries signed a landmark deal with Iran that dismantled much of Iran’s nuclear development program in exchange for the lifting of international sanctions. The agreement aimed to slow down Iran’s progress toward building a nuclear weapon, but critics argued that it gave Iran too much in return. President Donald J. Trump—one of the deal’s leading critics—removed the United States from the agreement in 2018 and reimposed sanctions on Iran. European countries objected to this move and in response, created a barter system that allowed companies to skirt U.S. sanctions and continue conducting business with Iran. It’s unclear whether that will be enough to keep the deal alive. Iran has declared its intentions to once again pursue nuclear weapons if the original terms of the deal are not met, a position re-emphasized following the January 2020 U.S. killing of a top Iranian general. Were the Iran deal to collapse altogether, it could ignite a nuclear arms race in one of the most unstable parts of the world.

Source: Hasan Tosun/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

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Emboldened Russia Intervenes in Syrian Civil War

Smoke rises after Russian war crafts hit a Syrian opposition controlled town in Aleppo, Syria on October 13, 2015.

Source: Mamun Abu Omer/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

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Russian warplanes bombarded several towns across the Syrian countryside in 2015. The airstrikes—Moscow’s first military foray into Syria’s devastating civil war—targeted rebel forces who opposed the country’s oppressive ruler, Bashar al-Assad. The intervention fundamentally shifted the course of the war in favor of the Assad regime. It also marked Russia’s first military intervention in a conflict outside former Soviet borders since the Cold War. Coming just a year after the Crimean annexation, Russia’s involvement in Syria is consistent with a recent trend of Russia reasserting itself in geopolitical affairs. Over the past decade, Russia has backed governments and armed groups in Syria, Ukraine, Venezuela, and elsewhere, often those that oppose the United States and Western Europe. In 2016, the Russian prime minister went as far as to say the world had slid into a new cold war.

Smoke rises after Russian war crafts hit a Syrian opposition controlled town in Aleppo, Syria on October 13, 2015.

Source: Mamun Abu Omer/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

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European Union Writes Global Digital Standards

In 2018, the EU implemented the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), a sweeping data privacy measure that gives individuals greater control over their personal data. The law applies to all companies that process the data of EU citizens, regardless of whether the company is based in Europe. But the EU hopes to extend these rights to more than just its citizens by limiting access to its market of five hundred million consumers if countries do not meet Europe’s standards. The EU is also standing up to U.S. tech giants like Apple, Facebook, and Google, levying more than twenty billion euros in penalties since 2016 for violating EU competition, tax, and antitrust rules. Their success, however, may be somewhat limited—Google is just too big to be seriously affected by even a multi-billion-dollar fine.

Russia Interferes in National Elections

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Since 2015, Russia has interfered in elections in the United States, France, Germany, and the UK, among other countries. This meddling has taken several forms, including promoting disinformation on social media, hacking into campaign email accounts, and channeling funds to select candidates. In so doing, Moscow has sought to promote its preferred candidates and influence the results of national elections. In the UK, for example, Russian Twitter bots allegedly interfered to support the “leave” faction before the Brexit vote. Russia also funds far-right parties in Europe, including a neo-Nazi party in Germany. Although it is unclear just how much Russian interference has swayed these elections, its intentions are incontrovertible and troubling for European—and global—democracy.

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Independence Movements Challenge Europe’s Borders

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In 2017, millions of Catalans (residents of the semi-autonomous, northeastern corner of Spain) voted to secede and thus become an independent country. The Spanish government in Madrid, threatened by the potential breakup of their country and the loss of a major economic hub in Barcelona, nullified the referendum and arrested the region’s political leaders. Though many think of Europe as a static entity with defined borders, the Catalan independence movement is one of a handful of efforts to redraw those borders. Some movements are entirely peaceful; Scotland held a referendum in 2014 on whether it should leave the United Kingdom. (It decided not to.) Others are more volatile; for years, violence rocked the Basque region in France and Spain. While several of those movements aim for independent territory, many simply seek more autonomy.

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Europe, China Race to Exploit Changing Arctic

The United States, Canada, and six European countries (Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Russia, and Sweden) control land in the Arctic Circle. For centuries, this largely uninhabited tundra provided little strategic value. But as global temperatures rise and the Arctic remains unfrozen for longer and longer each year, these countries are now racing to establish Arctic shipping routes and extract the region’s potentially vast natural resources, including gas, oil, and rare earth minerals. Moreover, China—despite not actually bordering the Arctic—is investing heavily in energy exploration and infrastructure development in the region. Some, like Russia, welcome China’s outside presence. China needs energy sources, Russia needs buyers for its reserves (especially in light of Western sanctions), and both stand to gain from the relationship. Meanwhile, others—like Denmark and Iceland—view China’s growing presence in the Arctic with more caution, concerned that it could provide Beijing with economic and even military leverage over their countries.

New Geopolitical Circumstances Drive Calls for Unified European Security

European political leaders walk toward stage with European military leaders at PESCO event in Brussels, Belgian on December 14, 2017.

Source: European Union

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Changing conditions within and outside the EU have created a new geopolitical reality. Since 2014, a wave of terrorism has swept Western Europe, Russia boldly annexed Crimea, and the United Kingdom, the EU’s second largest military power, voted to leave the bloc. Meanwhile, U.S. President Donald Trump has criticized Europe’s contributions to NATO, threatening the seventy-year-old security alliance’s continuation. In 2017, in response to these developments, the EU revived its efforts to forge a common defense policy--attempts that date back to the 1950s --through the Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO) initiative. PESCO would not give the EU power over national armed forces, a level of control that countries have historically resisted. Instead, it creates incentives to pool research and coordinate defensive equipment and technology (European countries use 17 different types of tanks, for example, while the United States uses one). Europe insists it’s not seeking to alienate NATO by stepping up its own defense efforts, but rather to complement it: any PESCO returns can be made available to NATO and UN operations.

European political leaders walk toward stage with European military leaders at PESCO event in Brussels, Belgian on December 14, 2017.

Source: European Union

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Geopolitics

Europe - Politics

AMartinez — Tue, 28 Jan 2020 19:51:35 +0000

Europe - Politics

Europe’s claims on liberal, democratic traditions date back centuries. Innovations like the Magna Carta (which set limits on English royal authority) and the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (which guaranteed certain natural rights to French citizens) helped shape political systems not only on the European continent but also in former colonies—including the United States. A more modern political project, however, is central to understanding Europe’s politics today. The European Union (EU) started as an economic partnership with a political goal—to maintain peace—and it has succeeded in achieving its initial aims. The regional rivalries and great-power dynamics that successive wars have been mostly dormant, to the benefit of Europeans and others. But how the EU navigates modern challenges—like migration, climate change, the fallout from the 2008 financial crisis, and domestic politics—remains an open question.

AMartinez Tue, 01/28/2020 - 14:51

What the European Union Actually Is

The EU is an economic and political union, created with the goal of promoting peace, security, and prosperity on the continent. It is made up of departments that are similar to the executive, legislative, and judicial branches in the United States, but it is certainly not the United States of Europe, as some of the Coal and Steel Community designers once hoped for. Instead, its political structure is somewhere between that of the United Nations, in which countries are the main decision-makers, and the United States, where a collection of states operate with some autonomy under the clear authority of a federal government. Some of the decision-making bodies comprise people directly elected to serve in the EU; others are led by the heads of state of EU member countries. With a budget of roughly 170 billion euro, the EU creates rules governing farm subsidies, trade agreements, and data privacy, among others. A range of opinions exists about the direction the EU should take: enthusiasts seek more integration and push for an even stronger EU; Eurosceptics, meanwhile, are wary of transferring too much power from independent countries to a supranational body.

Why the EU Is (Mostly) in Brussels

View of the European Parliament in Brussels, Belgium on October 9, 2019.

Source: Yves Herman/Reuters

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Brussels, the Belgian capital home to the EU headquarters, has become shorthand for the EU itself—think headlines about a “Brussels policy” or a “Brussels ban.” In the 1950s, the six countries that comprised the EU’s predecessor couldn’t decide where to base their new organization. Sensitive to history and eager to maintain a cooperative spirit, they decided to rotate through each member country alphabetically. Belgium was first. But by the time the group secured a building in Brussels, the EU’s roots took hold and it never left. Members of the European Parliament now spend most of their time in Brussels, but meet four days a month in Strasbourg, the symbolic border city between France and Germany—a $130 million per year commute that critics, who argue that the EU an expensive and bureaucratic undertaking, deride as a “traveling circus.”

View of the European Parliament in Brussels, Belgium on October 9, 2019.

Source: Yves Herman/Reuters

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Euroscepticism Runs From Tabloids to Ballot Box

Top row from left: The Sun front page on November 24, 2015; The Mail front page on July 27, 2010; The Daily Mail front page on August 3, 2010. Bottom row from left: Daily Express front page on May 19, 2011; Daily Express front page on Mat 2, 2011; Daily Express front page on November 15, 2012.

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The balance of power between national European governments and the EU is a major source of debate. These arguments manifest in myriad ways in Europe, from trivial tabloid myths about Brussels’ overreach, to meaningful votes on EU treaties and policies. Those skeptical of the EU have stoked fear, for example, that Brussels had banned a beloved British potato chip flavor, or was requiring Italians to make mozzarella from powdered milk. But so-called Euroscepticism manifests in nontrivial ways as well. In 2005, French and Dutch citizens voted to reject a European constitution that would have consolidated EU treaties into a single text (similar to the U.S. Constitution) and give the EU more decision-making control on foreign and security policy. More recently, a populist government won the election in Italy with anti-EU political messaging, promising to “take back control” of Italy’s borders and economy.

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Rise of Populism Tests European Institutions

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban waves to supporters after winning the parliamentary elections with members of his populist, right-wing Fidesz party on April 6, 2014 in Budapest.

Source: Attila Kisbenedek/AFP via Getty Images

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Across Europe, mainstream center-left and center-right parties have lost seats to populist parties on the far right and the far left. Mass migration, globalization, rising inequality, terrorism: the challenges of the past decade still dominate political debate across the region. The number of Europeans voting for populist parties in national elections has surged from 7 percent in 2000 to more than 25 percent in 2018. In some cases, such as in France, these insurgent parties put pressure on centrist ones, which still hold most of the power. In other cases, populists have eclipsed the mainstream. After far-right populist parties claimed victory in Hungary and Poland, they quickly revealed their authoritarian natures, going after independent judiciary and free press.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban waves to supporters after winning the parliamentary elections with members of his populist, right-wing Fidesz party on April 6, 2014 in Budapest.

Source: Attila Kisbenedek/AFP via Getty Images

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Emergency Powers Spark Concern in Hungary, Poland

Law and Justice (PiS) leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski (bottom right) and other parliamentarians vote at Polish Parliament during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in Warsaw, Poland, on April 6, 2020.

Source: Slawomir Kaminski/Agencja Gazeta via Reuters

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Certain European leaders are using the COVID-19 crisis to seize greater political power and erode already fragile democratic institutions. Experts fear these expanded powers could replace a public health crisis with a political one. Hungary, for example, enacted an emergency law in March 2020, that gave Prime Minister Viktor Orbán the right to rule by decree (without parliament’s involvement). With this authority, Orbán’s government passed a slate of legislation unrelated to combating COVID-19, including a law in May that banned legal recognition of Hungary’s transgender citizens. The emergency law also conferred on Orbán the power to suspend existing laws and jail those who publicize facts the government deems “distorted” or “false” for up to five years. Meanwhile, in Poland, the ruling party has tried to take advantage of the difficulty of in-person voting and public demonstrations by pushing for a controversial mail-in election and rushing through legislation previously blocked by popular protests.

Source: Slawomir Kaminski/Agencja Gazeta via Reuters

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2015 Migration Crisis Tests EU’s Asylum Policy

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In 2015, more than one million migrants entered Europe, and the influx—the largest migration of people since World War II —sparked a political crisis that put the EU’s asylum policy to the test. Since many of those who arrived in 2015 were refugees fleeing the Syrian civil war, European countries were bound by an EU rule called the Dublin Regulation, which requires refugees to apply for asylum in the country they first enter. But the common asylum policy quickly fell apart as countries started taking unilateral action. Italy, on the front line of the crisis, began turning away life boats operated by refugee aid groups. Financially struggling Greece and Hungary, along with Italy, stopped enforcing the Dublin Regulation and allowed migrants to pass through to wealthier countries like Germany and Sweden, which approved the vast majority of asylum applications. The EU tried to order other countries to take in additional refugees to help share the burden, but it was largely powerless to enforce a quota system.

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Navigating a Way Out of the European Union

Anti-Brexit activist Steve Bray (L) argues with a pro-Brexit protester during a demonstration on January 08, 2019 in London, England.

Source: Jack Taylor/Getty Images

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The most decisive rejection of Brussels came in 2016, when a slim majority of British voters (52 percent) opted to leave the EU—the first time a country has voted to do so. In the years after the Brexit vote, Britain’s attempt to navigate a path out revealed just how interdependent Europe has become. This inextricability demonstrated, in a way, the argument of both sides: the “Leavers” claimed that Brussels exerted too much control over Britons’ lives while the “Remainers” pointed out that losing EU benefits (like access to the world’s largest trading zone) would harm British people in many ways. It quickly became clear that no one had a plan that could both rid Britain of unpopular entanglements without sacrificing certain benefits from Brussels. The United Kingdom officially left the EU on January 31, 2020. However, many aspects relating to its future relationship with the organization are yet to be finalized.

Anti-Brexit activist Steve Bray (L) argues with a pro-Brexit protester during a demonstration on January 08, 2019 in London, England.

Source: Jack Taylor/Getty Images

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How Not Being in the EU Works

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As much as the EU frames the region’s politics, there are still twenty-two European countries outside the EU. Some countries, such as Serbia and Montenegro, want to join and are trying to meet the requirements for EU membership, like proving they have stable democratic institutions and functioning financial sectors. Others, like Russia and Azerbaijan, have no intention of joining. But the need to work with the EU is an unavoidable reality in the region. Most European countries that are not EU members have treaties with the EU that facilitate trade, and some participate in certain EU agreements. Norway, for example, has nearly full access to the EU market and faces few trade restrictions. In exchange, Norway contributes to the EU budget and has to comply with certain EU rules—but has no say in how those rules are created.

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Russia’s Divergent Political Trajectory

Russian President Vladimir Putin delivers a speech during a ceremony at the Kremlin in Moscow on February 23, 2018.

Source: Alexey Nikolsky/AFP via Getty Images

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In the early twentieth century, as most European countries transitioned from constitutional or limited monarchies to democracy, Russia was on a different trajectory. In 1917, the country was a czarist autocracy; it emerged from civil war five years later as a socialist state. The Soviet Union, which existed until 1991, was a collection of Eastern European republics. In the West, these republics were described as being behind the Iron Curtain because they had largely closed markets and no participation in the EU or other European organizations. When the Soviet Union collapsed, many in the West hoped relations with Russia would normalize. Today, Russia’s political system is technically a semi-presidential republic, but its president, Vladimir Putin, is so powerful that many observers describe it as an autocracy, and hopes of a democratic Russia have faded.

Russian President Vladimir Putin delivers a speech during a ceremony at the Kremlin in Moscow on February 23, 2018.

Source: Alexey Nikolsky/AFP via Getty Images

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Politics

Europe - Economics

AMartinez — Tue, 28 Jan 2020 19:25:52 +0000

Europe - Economics

As in other regions, certain European countries belong to an economic or customs union—a “single market”—that makes trade between its members seamless. Unique to Europe, however, is the eurozone, a monetary union in which all members use the same currency. The eurozone is contained within the European Union (EU); most, but not all, EU members use the euro. The eurozone functioned well initially but faced deep challenges after the 2008 financial crisis, when countries were left with limited tools to fix their own economic problems. Understanding what integration means for countries in and out of the eurozone is critical to understanding Europe’s economy today.

AMartinez Tue, 01/28/2020 - 14:25

Europe’s Economy Towers, but Challenges Persist

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At almost $19 trillion, the gross domestic product (GDP) of the EU is the second highest in the world, behind only the United States. Germany is by far Europe’s biggest economy, accounting for more than a fifth of the EU’s economic output. It is an industrial powerhouse—particularly in automotive, mechanical engineering, and chemical and electrical industries—and the third largest exporting nation after China and the United States. But Germany and other large European economies, like France, Italy, and the United Kingdom, face obstacles, as global challenges (like trade tensions and years-long uncertainty surrounding Brexit) have combined with domestic ones (political instability in Italy) to limit their economic growth.

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Europe’s Inequality Breaks Down Along Geographic Lines

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While Europe is economically strong overall, a stark income gap exists across the continent: EU countries enjoy higher standards of living than most of their non-EU neighbors. Broadly, this translates into an East-West divide. The average EU resident makes more than $36,000 per year (more than three times the global average). By contrast, in Europe’s poorest country, Ukraine (which is not in the EU), residents make just $3,000 per year. Unemployment also varies widely, and tends to follow a North-South division. Germany’s unemployment rate is under 4 percent, compared to nearly 20 percent in Greece. Youth unemployment is an even more pronounced challenge. In Greece, youth unemployment rates reached a sky-high peak of 60 percent in 2013. Italy and Spain’s rates are both above 30 percent. (For context, U.S. unemployment rate during the Great Depression maxed out at 25 percent.)

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Understanding the Euro

If you have traveled around Europe before, it’s likely you used just one currency—the euro. But that wasn’t always the case. Just twenty years ago, you would need pesetas for Spain, francs for France, and deutsche mark for Germany. But today, nineteen European countries use the euro, and with a couple of exceptions, countries that join the EU are legally obligated to adopt the currency. Before they can do so, however, they need to prove their economies are viable according to convergence criteria. Some countries, like the United Kingdom and Denmark, opted out of the eurozone from the beginning, because they were unwilling to cede their sovereignty of economic policy-making. The euro, the culmination of economic integration, presents risks and rewards beyond mere EU membership: common currency brings collective strength, but economic woes in one country can quickly spread to the whole eurozone.

Trade-Offs of the Eurozone

Demonstrators gather near the Greek parliament on February 11, 2015 in Athens, Greece to support their government as it attempts to re-negotiate the terms of its bailout with the EU.

Source: Milos Bicanski/Getty Images

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When the euro works, its benefits are widespread. A common currency allows weaker countries to borrow money at similar rates as stronger economies (that is, more cheaply). Because the euro is so widely used, it is considered a safe bet, which lowers interest rates and encourages foreign investment. But with shared benefits come shared risks: in exchange for a stronger currency, countries must accept decreased autonomy. The eurozone crisis, which began in 2010 after the global financial crisis, required wealthier countries, like Germany, to compensate for less well-off members, like Greece. In exchange for adopting austerity measures (cutting government spending on welfare and pensions), Greece received a series of bailouts from the European Union. Both countries ended up believing they were worse off: Germans resented bailing out their struggling (or, in their view, fiscally irresponsible) southern neighbors, while Greeks resented being directed (or, in their view, bullied) by powerful Germany to accept major spending cuts its citizens did not vote for.

Demonstrators gather near the Greek parliament on February 11, 2015 in Athens, Greece to support their government as it attempts to re-negotiate the terms of its bailout with the EU.

Source: Milos Bicanski/Getty Images

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Strength in Numbers: The Power of EU’s Collective Trade Policy

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As an economic bloc, the European Union offers its twenty-eight member countries the collective strength that their national economies alone could not have had individually. Take a look at international trade: the EU has a single foreign trade policy, with the goal of increasing trade both within Europe and internationally. From its founding in 1999 to 2010, EU foreign trade doubled; in 2018, the EU countries together were the top export market for the United States. This collective power allows the EU to set the global agenda on trade-related issues, including data privacy, environmental protection, sustainable development, and human rights standards.

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One Monetary Policy, Nineteen Fiscal Policies...What Could Go Wrong?

The eurozone is a monetary union, but not a fiscal union, meaning countries in the eurozone lack control over their own monetary policies (setting interest rates and controlling the amount of money in circulation). Instead, the European Central Bank (ECB) sets a single eurozone interest rate and controls the money supply. The nineteen eurozone countries, meanwhile, control their own fiscal policies (taxes and government spending). The mismatch between what levers governments or national central banks can pull, and which ones the ECB can, was blamed for prolonging the eurozone crisis. When the recession hit the United Kingdom, which opted out of the euro, its central bank was free to act in its own national interest, and increased the amount of money in circulation to help alleviate the crisis. But in the eurozone, the ECB hesitated to act, leaving countries with only fiscal policy options, like increasing taxes and cutting spending.

Italy’s Budget Fight With EU Highlights Future Challenges

Italy's Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte (center rear) and fellow lawmakers attend a parliamentary session on Italy's 2019 budget on December 29, 2018 in Rome, amidst complaints it was written by Brussels.

Source: Alberto Pizzoli/AFP via Getty Images

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While the eurozone crisis is largely over, Italy’s economy (the EU’s fourth-largest) is smaller today than it was before the crisis hit in 2008. With high debt and towering unemployment, Italy’s struggling economy is a major cause for concern in Brussels. In June 2018, a populist government took power in Italy, with a platform of “taking back control of its borders and its economy.” The new government blamed Brussels for stifling its economy with strict rules, like capping Italy’s debt, and created a massive budget to fund its campaign promises. The EU rejected the budget, prompting a game of chicken, which the EU ultimately won. The populist government may have folded in this round, but twenty years after adopting the euro, Italy’s economy has never really reformed to become more like Germany’s. As a result, experts questioning the sustainability of the eurozone often cite Italy’s precarious economic situation.

Source: Alberto Pizzoli/AFP via Getty Images

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Economic Crisis Brings Opportunity for Greater Integration

European Council President Charles Michel attends a conference call with European leaders on the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Brussels, Belgium, on March 10, 2020.

Source: Stephanie Leqocq via Reuters

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When COVID-19 spread throughout the European Union (EU) in 2020, governments responded by closing borders, imposing national quarantines, and shutting down factories to curb transmission of the deadly virus. Experts projected the economic fallout from these measures would plunge the EU into its deepest recession since its formation in 1993 and reduce its GDP by a staggering 7.4 percent in 2020. Many of the hardest-hit south European economies—notably Italy and Spain—called on the EU to provide emergency relief funding. However, several north European countries—including Austria, Denmark, the Netherlands, and Sweden (also known as the EU’s frugal four)—argued that they should not be responsible for bailing out their southern neighbors, much like during the 2010 eurozone crisis. With the EU highly divided, France and Germany—its two largest economies—proposed a breakthrough EU recovery fund in May 2020. The final deal not only provides much-needed relief to European countries reeling from the economic, political, and public health crises of COVID-19 but also make Europe more integrated than ever before.

European Council President Charles Michel attends a conference call with European leaders on the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Brussels, Belgium, on March 10, 2020.

Source: Stephanie Leqocq via Reuters

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Economics

Europe - People and Society

AMartinez — Tue, 28 Jan 2020 19:08:38 +0000

Europe - People and Society

Europe has a reputation for its high living standards, given its wealth, promotion of human rights, commitment to social spending, and democratic institutions. On average, European Union (EU) residents earn more than three times the global average. Most countries in Europe have universal health coverage, which has helped increase the average life expectancy. And European women experience high levels of gender equality. The region also boasts literacy rates well above the global average and has a long history of providing public education. Politically, there are major concerns about democratic backsliding in Hungary and Poland, and outside the EU there are autocratic outliers like Russia and Turkey. But on the whole, most of Europe is still considered free, with longstanding democratic institutions and some of the oldest parliamentary systems in the world.

AMartinez Tue, 01/28/2020 - 14:08

Country or Continent: Where Do European Allegiances Lie?

Europe is home to more than 800 million people who live across fifty countries. The EU counts twenty-four official languages and more than sixty other regional and minority languages, in addition to the languages spoken by migrants. Given this diversity, a single European identity can be hard to define. The EU was designed to help forge one, encouraging free movement between countries by limiting border controls, funding student exchange programs, and removing restrictions on working in other EU countries. While a shared European identity may never supplant national allegiances, polls show that about two-thirds of EU citizens feel attached to Europe: they are often younger, well-educated, and more affluent people who study in another country or speak more than one language . However, only about half feel a sense of attachment to the EU.

Europe Grapples With Migration Since World War II

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After World War II, most of Europe’s colonies in Africa and Asia achieved independence, driving a flow of migrants to the continent. Some were returning to the countries in which they were born, but most, seeking economic opportunity, had never before set foot in Europe. About 1.8 million people came to France from North Africa (mostly Algeria) and Southeast Asia; about half a million came to Portugal from its former African colonies; and about 300,000 arrived in the Netherlands from the Dutch East Indies. This marked a shift: for centuries, Europe had been a major source of global migration, not a destination, and responses to immigrants across the region were uneven. The UK, for example, granted British citizenship to all former colonial subjects in 1948, but by the 1970s, the right to reside in the UK was restricted. Meanwhile, political shifts—including the collapse of the Soviet Union and the enlargement of the European Union—caused surges of people to move within the region, from Eastern to Western Europe. The most recent wave of migration in 2015 saw more than one million migrants, many of them refugees, flee violent conflicts in Africa and the Middle East, particularly the Syrian civil war. Germany and Sweden initially accepted a large number of refugees, but in a climate of increased security threats and with economies still recovering from the 2008 financial crisis, accommodating migrants became politically unpopular. Half of Europeans polled in 2018 viewed migration as the EU’s biggest challenge.

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Terrorist Attacks and Migration Crisis Reshape European Society

Police patrol near the Eiffel Tower on Novemeber 14, 2015, the day after a series of deadly attacks in Paris.

Source: Yves Herman/Reuters

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Over the past five years, two shocks—a wave of religiously inspired terrorist attacks and the influx of migrants from across the Mediterranean—have generated disunity in an already divided Europe. Since 2015, terrorist attacks have killed hundreds of people in major European cities, including Brussels, Nice, and Paris. Concurrently, more than two million migrants have entered Europe, often fleeing violence in Afghanistan, the Middle East, and sub-Saharan Africa. Responses to these dual crises have reshaped European politics and society. France declared a state of emergency and reimposed border controls —a major reversal on a continent that prizes freedom of movement. In Hungary, a public backlash against immigrants led to the construction of fences on its southern border. Opposition to immigration has also galvanized right-wing nationalist parties in countries like Germany and Italy. Together, these factors have contributed to a realignment of political power in Europe with traditional centrist parties losing out to right-wing, anti-immigration groups.

Police patrol near the Eiffel Tower on Novemeber 14, 2015, the day after a series of deadly attacks in Paris.

Source: Yves Herman/Reuters

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Security Challenges Threaten EU’s Promise of Free Movement

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The free movement of people is a core EU value, along with the free movement of labor, capital, and goods. This is most clearly embodied in Europe’s visa-free Schengen Area, which eliminated border controls among twenty-six European countries when it was created in 1995. That means that people and goods can move seamlessly between the countries of the Schengen zone without border checks, saving time and money. Every day, 170,000 French citizens head to work across the border in Switzerland (which is not part of the EU but is part of the Schengen zone), then drive home to France as if it were the next town; 70,000 Italians and 60,000 Germans do the same . But recent security challenges threaten Schengen’s viability. Concerns about terrorism or the 2015 migration crisis prompted six countries—Austria, Denmark, France, Germany, Norway, and Sweden—to reintroduce border controls. Bringing back hard borders does more than impinge on core values of the EU; it has major financial implications: more than 75 percent of goods in the EU are transported by road, and border checks can result in expensive delays.

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Pandemic-Driven Travel Restrictions Threaten Europe’s Crops

An employee of the agricultural company Azienda Agricola Fiorentino trims a field and destroys vegetables — since the company has not been able to sell kilos of its products due to the lack of agricultural workers since the country remains blocked to fight the coronavirus (COVID-19) —in Sant'Angelo Romano, Italy on April 22, 2020.

Source: Guglielmo Mangiapane/Reuters

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West European farms depend on seasonal workers from Eastern Europe—an arrangement made possible by EU policies facilitating free movement and coordinated labor laws. But as COVID-19 propelled countries to erect border controls and travel restrictions, laborers have been unable to reach farms several countries away. In spring 2020, Romanians who typically harvest white asparagus in Germany, for example, couldn’t pass through the Czech Republic and Hungary, which had closed their borders. By the end of March 2020, French farmers said they were missing two hundred thousand workers; Germany estimated a deficit of three hundred thousand. Prized crops rotted in fields as countries put out calls for out-of-work citizens, furloughed from other industries, to help with the harvest. In addition to short-term economic consequences for farmers unable to salvage their crops, the EU is concerned about the implications for the region’s food supply. The EU has urged countries to exempt seasonal laborers from travel restrictions by designating them “critical workers” but can’t force national governments to do so.

Source: Guglielmo Mangiapane/Reuters

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Reactions to Changing Demographics on the Soccer Field

Mohamed Salah (L) of Liverpool battles with Arthur Masuaku (R) of West Ham United during the Premier League debut on August 12, 2018 in Liverpool, United Kingdom.

Source: Arfa Griffiths/West Ham United FC via Getty Images

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Some of the most visible signs of Europe’s growing diversity are found in its beloved soccer (or football) teams. More than half the players of the 2018 World Cup–winning French national team, for example, have African ancestry. In the aftermath of the 2015 migration crisis, this growing diversity—and fans’ reactions to players, both negative and positive—has revealed the region’s broader ideas about immigrants. A common experience among second- or third-generation immigrant players is the feeling of an earned identity: the tendency to be described as Belgian, French, or German when they win, but as Egyptian, of Congolese descent, or simply, as immigrants, when they lose. But, in one case, the high visibility of a Muslim player has actually increased tolerance, not sparked division. Liverpool, home to famed Egyptian player Mohamed Salah, has avoided the spike in Islamophobia seen in much of the United Kingdom. Poll results show more Liverpool fans see Islam as compatible with British values than elsewhere and write fewer Islamophobic tweets; the city experiences also fewer hate crimes than expected.

Mohamed Salah (L) of Liverpool battles with Arthur Masuaku (R) of West Ham United during the Premier League debut on August 12, 2018 in Liverpool, United Kingdom.

Source: Arfa Griffiths/West Ham United FC via Getty Images

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Cost of Going Gray: Europe’s Aging Challenge

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For the first time in history, there are more people in the world over the age of sixty-five than under the age of five. Europe’s population, like much of that of the West, is aging. Life expectancy in the EU has increased by more than two years per decade since the 1960s, and, at the same time, Europeans are having fewer children. An aging Europe presents economic challenges: fewer young people could mean labor shortages, which would hamper economic growth, and reduced income tax revenue. At the same time, increasing elderly populations stretch countries’ pension and health-care systems, which European countries already support at relatively high rates. Compared to other regions, Europe devotes more of its public spending to aging, rather than relying on its citizens to retire later or dip into their own savings. Between 2016 and 2070, the total cost of aging in the EU (public spending on pensions, health care, long-term care, education, and unemployment benefits) will likely increase to 26.7 percent of gross domestic product (GDP).

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Religious Diversity Increases, Secularism Finds Challenges

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Whether Catholic, Protestant, or Eastern Orthodox, the majority of Europeans have historically fallen under one umbrella religion: Christianity. For much of European history, these divisions sparked conflict, resulting in devastating wars between Catholics and Protestants, in particular. But in the seventeenth century, European leaders began championing religious tolerance, and religious divisions gradually receded to the backburner. Today, the majority of Western Europeans are non-practicing Christians; nearly half of the Netherlands identifies as religiously unaffiliated. (One major exception is Northern Ireland, where religious and political identities are bound together. “Peace walls” still snake through the capital, Belfast, separating Protestant areas from Catholic ones, corresponding to those loyal to union with Britain from those who favor an independent, united Ireland.) Beyond Christianity, Europe is now home to people from more diverse religious backgrounds who are challenging some ways in which European countries impose secularism, such as laws prohibiting religious expression. To some French Muslims, in particular, a secularism that outlaws the wearing of face veils is repressive, not liberating.

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“Rainbow Curtain” Divides Europe

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During the Cold War, the Iron Curtain was the barrier between Europe’s Soviet-aligned countries in the east and the democratic countries of the west. Thirty years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, civil liberties across Europe continue to look starkly different on either side of this historic divide. In the case of marriage equality, this disparity is sometimes referred to as Europe’s “rainbow curtain.” For example, the majority of Western European countries have legalized gay marriage, but no former Communist countries have done so. On either side of the curtain, opinions are polarized. According to a recent poll, 90 percent of Russians oppose same-sex marriage, while more than 85 percent of those in Denmark, the Netherlands, and Sweden are for it. The EU encourages its members to recognize same-sex marriage or civil unions, but does not impose the change. It does, however, protect same-sex couples’ rights to freedom of movement and residence. But human rights abuses persist in Europe: for example, gay men in Chechnya, an autonomous region of Russia, are systematically detained and sometimes even killed for their sexual identity.

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Regional Politics Take Stage in Europe’s Oldest Singing Contest

Ukrainian singer Jamala wins the 2016 Eurovision Song Contest on May 15, 2016 in Stockholm, Sweden.

Source: Vyacheslav Prokofyev\TASS via Getty Images

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In 2016, two hundred million people tuned in to Eurovision, the wildly popular song contest pitting more than forty (mostly) European countries against one another during a three-day multinational singing showdown. (Think American Idol crossed with the Olympics.) A complicated voting process, combining audience votes with the judgment of an expert panel, is intended to give each contestant a fair shake, but shared cultural and regional ties mean that Greece and Cyprus, for example, can always count on each other’s votes. Like many postwar creations, Eurovision was designed to cultivate peaceful relations between European countries, replacing armed battles with elaborate performances. But in recent years, political realities have infiltrated its sunny facade. Russia’s contestant was booed in 2014, a few months after it invaded the Ukrainian region of Crimea, and in 2016, Ukraine won with a pointed song about Stalin’s deportation of the Crimean Tatar ethnic group during World War II.

Ukrainian singer Jamala wins the 2016 Eurovision Song Contest on May 15, 2016 in Stockholm, Sweden.

Source: Vyacheslav Prokofyev\TASS via Getty Images

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People and Society

Europe - Modern History

btran — Tue, 28 Jan 2020 18:52:49 +0000

Europe - Modern History

For the past seventy-five-odd years, Europe has largely been at peace. But for much of its history, Europe was at war with itself. Borders shifted as empires rose and fell. For example, since 1461, Sarajevo has been part of nine different empires, kingdoms, states, and countries. Epic campaigns fought over religion, territory, and political power—like the Hundred Years’ War, Thirty Years’ War, and Napoleonic Wars—wiped out huge portions of the population. Sometimes these conflicts led to diplomatic innovations: the 1648 Peace of Westphalia established the modern concept of sovereignty, the principle that countries have the right to control what happens within their borders, and should respect other countries’ boundaries. But after each peace treaty, even one as significant as Westphalia, war broke out again.

btran Tue, 01/28/2020 - 13:52

Europe Shapes World for Four Hundred Years

Beginning in the fifteenth century, competition between leaders in Europe and the search for resources and new markets drove European powers to colonize land overseas. Empires including the British, Dutch, French, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish controlled territory across every region of the world. In fact, from 1492, when a Spanish expedition landed in the Americas, to the start of World War I, Europe, accounting for just 8 percent of global land mass, controlled more than 80 percent of the world. Europeans exported ideas about government and religion, built infrastructure and created trading routes, and introduced new technology to the Americas, Africa, and Southeast Asia. Europeans profited immensely from colonization, which came at the direct expense of colonized communities and was responsible for violence, enslavement, and forced religious conversion, resulting in the destruction of entire civilizations.

World War I Devastates Europe

In the lead–up to World War I, Europe, divided into two rival alliances, maintained an uneasy peace. The spark was lit in 1914, when a Serbian terrorist assassinated the heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary. The conflict reverberated throughout Europe as countries rushed to defend their allies. Fighting was gruesome, characterized by nineteenth–century battle tactics with twentieth century weapons; generals ordered charges into hailstorms of machine-gun fire and gas attacks in trenches. The toll was catastrophic: at least 8 million soldiers and unknown millions of civilians (estimates range from 5 million to 10 million) died. Four European empires—Ottoman, Russian, German, and Austro-Hungarian —collapsed, creating a number of fledgling countries with new, sometimes arbitrary borders and unstable economies. The exhausted survivors had an overwhelming sense that this war, surely, was “the war to end all wars.” But the peace agreement, the Treaty of Versailles, imposed war debts on Germany and forced it to accept all responsibility for starting the conflict. Meanwhile, the United States, which suffered modest losses compared to Europe, retreated back across the Atlantic instead of leading the charge on international cooperation, all of which created instability rather than resolution. World War I did not end Europe’s wars.

Russian Revolution and the Rise of the Soviet Union

While World War I was raging, a separate conflict erupted in Russia. In 1917, millions of Russians overthrew their centuries-old monarchy and soon established the world’s first socialist country. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), or the Soviet Union, brought together Russia and fourteen other ethnic republics previously ruled by the Russian Empire. From Moscow, the Soviet Union exerted its influence over a half-dozen nominally independent countries in Eastern Europe that came to be known as Soviet satellite states. In the Soviet Union, the government controlled all major resources like land and steel; although education and industrialization spread rapidly, political repression was brutal. From the 1920s to 1953, millions of civilians were executed, sent to a system of labor camps known as the Gulag, or starved in forced famine under the rule of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. All the while, the Soviet Union solidified its role as a global superpower.

Fascism Grips Europe Between World Wars

Benito Mussolini (L) and Adolf Hitler (R) at Munich Station in Germany in September 1937.

Source: Daily Herald Archive/National Science & Media Museum / Science & Society Picture Library

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In 1936, General Francisco Franco launched a bloody coup against Spain’s young democratic government and, following three years of civil war, ruled as dictator. Franco joined a string of strongmen leaders in post–World War I Europe, all of whom amassed power by violently suppressing opponents and dismantling democratic institutions like free elections and an independent press, characteristics of an ideology that came to be known as fascism. The continent’s first fascist leader, Benito Mussolini, made himself dictator of Italy in 1925; Adolf Hitler followed in 1933. Their messages emphasizing national strength, and, in Hitler’s case, racial hierarchy, resonated in some countries where the unsettling new forces of globalization, capitalism, immigration, and agricultural technologies collided with the physical and economic devastation of war. But many Europeans did resist fascism, as evidenced by the bitter Spanish Civil War. Thousands of foreign volunteers flocked to Spain to fight on the side of the republican government and defend democracy. It was, in a sense, the first battle of World War II—but this time, fascism won.

Benito Mussolini (L) and Adolf Hitler (R) at Munich Station in Germany in September 1937.

Source: Daily Herald Archive/National Science & Media Museum / Science & Society Picture Library

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World War II Strips Europe of Global Supremacy

Citizens of Hamburg, Germany line up among the city's ruins for soup rations on March 26, 1946.

Source: Fred Ramage/Keystone Features/Getty Images

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After World War I, Adolf Hitler’s anti-Semitic, fascist Nazi party began taking increasingly violent measures against Germany’s Jews: revoking their citizenship, denying them basic civil rights, burning synagogues, and attacking and killing the Jewish people. Meanwhile, Hitler believed the German people (the so-called Aryan race) were entitled to greater living space, or Lebensraum, in Eastern Europe, at the expense of the non-Aryan populations who lived there. In 1939, he invaded Poland—Nazi Germany’s first step in a plan to conquer Europe. Countries that had spent the past decade avoiding the growing reality of another major war were now involved in a global conflict of an even greater scale than the previous world war. World War II would become the deadliest conflict in human history; an estimated sixty million people—3 percent of the world’s population—died. Both the Axis powers (Germany, Italy, and Japan) and the Allies (France, Great Britain, the Soviet Union, and later, the United States) targeted civilian populations, leveling cities including Dresden, London, and Tokyo. Germany surrendered in May 1945, bringing an end to the war in Europe. World War II officially ended several months later, after the United States dropped two atomic bombs on Japan, forever changing the stakes of war. Europe entered the twentieth century as the premier global power but emerged from World War II subordinate to the new superpowers: the United States and the Soviet Union.

Citizens of Hamburg, Germany line up among the city's ruins for soup rations on March 26, 1946.

Source: Fred Ramage/Keystone Features/Getty Images

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From the Holocaust, Human Rights Canon Emerges

Nazi leader Hermann Goering sits in the defendent box accused of crimes against humanity, among other charges, at the Nuremberg Trials in Germany on March 16, 1946.

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A most horrific chapter of World War II was the Holocaust, the state-sponsored killing of over six million Jews. From 1941 to 1945, Germans and their allies systematically rounded up European Jews and others deemed outside the Aryan race (including the Roma, Slavs, homosexuals, and the intellectually disabled). They were either shot en masse or sent to camps across Germany and Poland with names that have become synonymous with death—Auschwitz, Buchenwald, Treblinka—where the majority were killed in gas chambers. Called the “Final Solution to the Jewish Question” by the Nazis, this policy of annihilation was driven by Hilter’s anti-Semitic ideology. After the war, some Nazi officials who helped carry out the Holocaust were charged with crimes against humanity. Meanwhile, terms like genocide emerged as part of a canon of human rights law designed to ensure that history, in this case, would not repeat itself.

Nazi leader Hermann Goering sits in the defendent box accused of crimes against humanity, among other charges, at the Nuremberg Trials in Germany on March 16, 1946.

Source: Keystone-France\Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images

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How the Cold War Froze Over

After World War II, the Soviet Union emerged as a major power with clear territorial ambitions, backing a communist coup in Czechoslovakia in 1948, for example, that alarmed the West. The nuclear-armed United States agreed to create a collective defense alliance, resulting in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), between the United States, Canada, and ten European countries, in 1949. Germany, meanwhile, was divided between a Soviet-controlled East and an American-guided West, ultimately becoming two countries. In 1955, NATO admitted West Germany as a new member. In response, the Soviet Union created its own regional alliance, the Warsaw Pact, which included the Soviet satellite states in Eastern Europe. In practice, this divided Europe between an American, nuclear-backed security guarantee (a “nuclear umbrella”) in the west and a Soviet one in the east. NATO’s military doctrine was “massive retaliation”; an attack on a NATO member would result in a large-scale nuclear response. A direct attack never occurred, but the Cold War often erupted into “hot wars” between proxy forces around the world, creating arenas for the two superpowers to come into conflict in countries like Korea, Cuba, Vietnam, and Afghanistan. Europe itself was fairly stable; while conflicts did flare up, like when the Soviet Union invaded Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968, the high-stakes nature of nuclear war kept things mostly cold.

Europe Tries Different Approach to Lasting Peace

Graphic of the founding states of the European Coal and Steel Community published January 9, 1952.

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European leaders knew that in order to build a peaceful Europe and forge a united front against the Soviet Union, they had to reintegrate West Germany economically. But given the enduring trauma of World War II, a strong Germany still inspired fear, especially in its next door neighbor and historical rival, France. In 1950, France’s foreign minister proposed a simple solution: France and Germany could share resources, specifically the coal and steel industries in the region between the two countries. By setting up a common market, a kind of trade bloc in which countries agree to remove most barriers to trade (like tariffs), the European Coal and Steel Community created economic benefits for any European country interested in joining. (Ultimately, it had six members.) More importantly, it would make going to war—preparations for which depended on coal and steel for weapons and ammunition—simply too expensive and impossible to plan for covertly. This economic union, the first step to European post-war integration, was designed to create a lasting peace and was the forerunner to the European Union.

Graphic of the founding states of the European Coal and Steel Community published January 9, 1952.

Source: DPA/Picture Alliance/Getty Images

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Soviet Response to Chernobyl Nuclear Disaster Hints at New Era

Front page of the San Francisco Chronicle from April 29, 1986.

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On April 26, 1986, firefighters rushed to the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine. A reactor had exploded, killing at least thirty emergency workers and exposing five million people to the effects of atomic fallout, as radioactive particles were carried into western Europe and Scandinavia. Days went by without an official acknowledgement of the disaster, a textbook Soviet response. But the 1980s was a decade of change in the Soviet Union. When he became leader, Mikhail Gorbachev was twenty years younger than his three predecessors, all of whom were born before World War I, and he believed the Soviet Union, with its stagnant economy, needed to reform. Gorbachev made a public statement regarding the crisis and called for foreign assistance, a major break from previous leaders. By 1989, the Soviet Union held elections, introduced free speech reforms known as glasnost, and backed down in the Cold War, halting Soviet missile deployments. Gorbachev tried to reform the Soviet Union to strengthen—not dismantle—it. Targeted changes eventually led to more sweeping ones, as the authoritarian system proved too inflexible to bend without breaking.

Front page of the San Francisco Chronicle from April 29, 1986.

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Fall of Berlin Wall Signals End of Soviet Union

Crowd watches as workmen deconstruct the Berlin Wall in Germany in late 1989.

Source: Robert Wallis/Corbis via Getty Images

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After World War II, Germany was divided into two, as was the capital, Berlin. The Berlin Wall fenced in West Berlin, a democratic pocket deep within East Germany, from 1961 to 1989. The wall was imposing: the section dividing Berlin was almost twelve feet tall and 27 miles long, reinforced with barbed wire, spikes, and landmines, and under constant surveillance. It was both an effective deterrent (more than one hundred people died trying to escape to West Berlin) and a powerful symbol of a divided Germany—and a divided Europe. As the Soviets relaxed oversight of their satellite states in the mid-1980s to focus on domestic reforms, Hungary opened its border with Austria, creating a route to the West that attracted thousands of East Germans. Meanwhile, East Germans began protesting against their Communist government. On November 9, 1989, officials abruptly announced the end of travel restrictions for East Germans, and thousands rushed to the Berlin Wall. In the weeks that followed, regime changes swept through the Soviet satellite states of Czechoslovakia, Romania, and Bulgaria with no pushback from Moscow; eleven months later, Germany was reunified. The democratic momentum in Soviet satellite states, combined with Gorbachev’s political reforms, destabilized Communist control within the Soviet Union and contributed to its eventual collapse in 1991, marking a swift end to the Cold War, a conflict that had endured for almost fifty years.

Crowd watches as workmen deconstruct the Berlin Wall in Germany in late 1989.

Source: Robert Wallis/Corbis via Getty Images

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Nuclear Risks Complicate End of Cold War

A worker cuts apart the booster of the SS-19 nuclear weapon at a missile dismantling site in Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine on February 26, 1999.

Source: Gleb Garanich/Reuters

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Western leaders celebrated when the Soviet Union abruptly ended in 1991. But its collapse presented a new challenge: with Moscow in turmoil, it was unclear what would become of the approximately thirty-nine thousand nuclear weapons that Russia and former Soviet countries controlled. U.S. and European leaders wanted to limit the number of countries in control of such weapons and to ensure that the weapons did not end up in the hands of terrorists. Ukraine, a former Soviet republic, held four thousand nuclear warheads—the world’s third-largest arsenal at the time. In exchange for a pledge from Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States to respect Ukrainian sovereignty and borders, the country agreed to transfer its warheads to Russia for disassembly, a significant diplomatic achievement. However, in 2014, Russia violated this pledge by invading Ukraine and annexing Crimea.

A worker cuts apart the booster of the SS-19 nuclear weapon at a missile dismantling site in Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine on February 26, 1999.

Source: Gleb Garanich/Reuters

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NATO Expands Its Mandate Following Cold War

A Dutch soldier from the NATO-led peacekeeping force in Bosnia stands at a checkpoint in Ahmici, Bosnia on December 18, 1997.

Source: Danilo Krstanovic/Reuters

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At the end of the Cold War in 1991, NATO faced the question of whether it should continue to exist after the collapse of its principal adversary, the Soviet Union. Rather than retire one of history’s most successful military partnerships, NATO officials reimagined the group’s mission. NATO would become a military coalition willing to confront new challenges beyond Europe, its traditional theater of operation. The first test of this mandate came when a bloody ethnic conflict erupted in Yugoslavia in the early 1990s. The alliance intervened in the country’s civil war amid reports of ethnic cleansing. For the next thirty years, NATO would not only operate strictly defensively in Western Europe, but also deploy to missions well beyond the continent, in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and elsewhere.

A Dutch soldier from the NATO-led peacekeeping force in Bosnia stands at a checkpoint in Ahmici, Bosnia on December 18, 1997.

Source: Danilo Krstanovic/Reuters

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Ever-Closer Union Looks Beyond Coal and Steel

As Europe reimagined its security alliance, it also expanded its central economic organization. In 1967, the six-member European Coal and Steel Community evolved into a larger organization, the European Community (EC). And in 1992, the EC became a full-fledged economic and political union, known as the European Union (EU). The Maastricht Treaty, which created the EU, laid the groundwork for a common European currency, the euro—the culmination of European economic integration. In addition to economic goals, the EU worked to secure “four freedoms” for its members: free movement of people, goods, services, and money. It set up the Schengen Area so that EU citizens could travel without passports, and created a pathway for other European countries to join the EU, forging an ever-closer union. One politician described this new EU mandate as the “bicycle theory of the European Union”: integration ought to keep moving forward or the EU would risk losing momentum and falling over. That was the plan, and at the close of the twentieth century, it appeared to be working.

Modern History

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Europe - U.S. Foreign Policy

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Early Attempts at International Cooperation Are Abandoned

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From Isolationism to Engagement: The Rise of the U.S.-Europe Partnership

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U.S. Intervention Shifts Tide of World War II

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How Containment Came to Define U.S. Cold War Strategy

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Rebuilding Europe and Containing Communism Through the Marshall Plan

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An Unprecedented Alliance: The North Atlantic Treaty Organization

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Proxy Fights Define U.S.-Soviet Cold War Relationship

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To Win War of Narratives, Cold War Goes to Space

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From Brief Détente, Agreements Emerge

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U.S. Pressure Contributes to End of Cold War

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Iraq War Exposes Divisions in Atlantic Partnership

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Tense Alliance Between Turkey and United States

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Return to Rivalry: U.S.-Russia Relations Deteriorate in Post-Cold War Era

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Questioning U.S.-Europe Alliance in Age of Trump

Europe - Geopolitics

Geopolitics

Russian Interventions in Georgia and Ukraine Reignite Tensions

Geopolitics

European Countries Attempt to Save Iran Nuclear Deal

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Emboldened Russia Intervenes in Syrian Civil War

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European Union Writes Global Digital Standards

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Russia Interferes in National Elections

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Independence Movements Challenge Europe’s Borders

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Europe, China Race to Exploit Changing Arctic

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New Geopolitical Circumstances Drive Calls for Unified European Security

Europe - Politics

Politics

What the European Union Actually Is

Politics

Why the EU Is (Mostly) in Brussels

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Euroscepticism Runs From Tabloids to Ballot Box

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Rise of Populism Tests European Institutions

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Emergency Powers Spark Concern in Hungary, Poland

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2015 Migration Crisis Tests EU’s Asylum Policy

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Social Democracy Shapes European Politics but Experiences Decline

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Navigating a Way Out of the European Union

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How Not Being in the EU Works

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Russia’s Divergent Political Trajectory

Europe - Economics

Economics

Europe’s Economy Towers, but Challenges Persist

Economics

Europe’s Inequality Breaks Down Along Geographic Lines